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News Archive 2009: February |
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Lunar spacecraft in HD
NASA's Lunar Reconnaissance Orbiter moon mapper and the LCROSS impactor that will search for evidence of water ice have arrived at Cape Canaveral to begin preparations for their joint launch aboard an Atlas 5 rocket on May 20. Check out standard and high definition video footage of the early launch preparations.
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Additional coverage for subscribers:
 VIDEO:
LUNAR RECONNAISSANCE ORBITER ARRIVES PLAY | HI-DEF
VIDEO:
TECHNICIANS CHECK OUT LRO'S SOLAR PANELS PLAY | HI-DEF
VIDEO:
TRUCK ARRIVES WITH LCROSS SPACECRAFT PLAY | HI-DEF
VIDEO:
LCROSS IS UNVEILED IN THE CLEANROOM PLAY | HI-DEF
VIDEO:
ANTONOV AIRCRAFT DELIVERS CENTAUR PLAY | HI-DEF
VIDEO:
CENTAUR ROCKET STAGE UNLOADED PLAY | HI-DEF
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Cassini maps global pattern of Titan's dunes
Titan's vast dune fields, which may act like weather vanes to determine general wind direction on Saturn's biggest moon, have been mapped by scientists who compiled four years of radar data collected by the Cassini spacecraft.
 FULL STORY
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OTHER HEADLINES Additional stories today
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Russian military satellite launched by Proton rocket -- A Russian Proton rocket hauled a military satellite into orbit early Saturday. The payload is believed to be a Raguda communications satellite.
Turbulence triggers birth of massive stars -- By probing the newborn stars in the constellation Serpens Cauda, scientists using the Submillimeter Array have captured the first moments of massive star formation.
Dust factory found around Cas A -- A team of astronomers have found that copious amounts of dust are being produced within the dead remains of the Cassiopeia A supernova remnant.
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North Korean space launch a "wolf in sheep's clothing"
An armada of air, sea and space intelligence assets are being deployed above and around North Korea in anticipation of the imminent test of a 105 ft. Taepo-Dong-2 Intercontinental Ballistic Missile disguised as a satellite launch vehicle.
FULL STORY
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Delta 4 rocket rolls out for the launcher's 10th mission
The Delta 4 rocket to launch an advanced U.S. weather satellite was rolled out to the pad at Cape Canaveral's Complex 37 this week. Liftoff of the GOES O spacecraft is scheduled for April 28.
FULL STORY
OUR DELTA ROCKET ARCHIVE
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Additional coverage for subscribers:
VIDEO:
DELTA 4 ROCKET ROLLED TO COMPLEX 37 PLAY | HI-DEF
VIDEO:
VEHICLE LIFTED UPRIGHT ONTO PAD PLAY | HI-DEF
VIDEO:
ERECTOR LOWERS BACK AWAY PLAY | HI-DEF
MORE:
PREVIOUS DELTA 4/GOES N COVERAGE
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Budget supports shuttle retirement, return to Moon
President Obama's first budget blueprint continues to support the Bush administration's directive to finish the space station and retire the shuttle in 2010 and to return astronauts to the moon around the end of the next decade. NASA receives a $2.4 billion budget increase under the proposal.
FULL STORY
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Launch of planet finder postponed one day
Engineers preparing to launch NASA's Kepler spacecraft aboard a Delta 2 rocket have delayed their liftoff to make sure the problem that doomed another booster this week won't repeat.
MISSION STATUS CENTER
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Commercial Zenit rocket launches with new Telstar
A Zenit rocket blasted off from Kazakhstan Thursday and deployed a Canadian communications satellite designed to bridge three continents with Internet and video services.
FULL STORY
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NASA targets March 12 for shuttle Discovery launch
NASA managers decided Wednesday enough progress had been made testing and evaluating suspect hydrogen flow control valves to tentatively set a March 12 target launch date for the shuttle Discovery's delayed mission to attach a final set of solar arrays to the international space station.
FULL STORY
STS-119 COVERAGE ARCHIVE
VIDEO: MISSION VIDEO COVERAGE
STORE: DISCOVERY CREW PATCH
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Scientists find asteroids are missing, and possibly why
University of Arizona scientists have uncovered a curious case of missing asteroids. The main asteroid belt is a zone containing millions of rocky objects between the orbits of Mars and Jupiter. The scientists find that there ought to be more asteroids there than researchers observe.
FULL STORY
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Watching Venus glow
An eerie glow has been observed in the night time atmosphere of Venus that shows Earth's neighboring planet as a temperamental place of high winds and turbulence.
FULL STORY
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March launch of Discovery possible, but not certain
NASA managers Tuesday ordered engineers to replace suspect hydrogen flow control valves aboard the shuttle Discovery with valves that have less flight time in a bid to reduce the chances of in-flight cracks that could lead to debris in a pressurization line.
FULL STORY
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Environmental satellite lost in launch failure
A Taurus rocket launching NASA's first environmental satellite dedicated to mapping atmospheric carbon dioxide failed to jettison its nose cone during launch Tuesday, causing the vehicle to fall back to Earth.
LAUNCH FAILURE STORY
MISSION STATUS CENTER - live updates!
IMAGES: LAUNCH PHOTO GALLERY
IMAGES: MONDAY'S PHOTO GALLERY
IMAGES: ROCKET'S LAUNCH CAMPAIGN
OUR TAURUS ARCHIVE
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Additional coverage for subscribers:
VIDEO:
TAURUS LAUNCH OF OCO SATELLITE FAILS PLAY
VIDEO:
FAILURE DECLARED BY NASA LAUNCH DIRECTOR PLAY
VIDEO:
POST-FAILURE NEWS BRIEFING PLAY
VIDEO:
HIGHLIGHTS OF THE TAURUS LAUNCH CAMPAIGN PLAY
VIDEO:
HIGHLIGHTS OF THE SATELLITE LAUNCH CAMPAIGN PLAY
VIDEO:
PRE-LAUNCH NEWS CONFERENCE PLAY
VIDEO:
MISSION SCIENCE PREVIEW BRIEFING PLAY
VIDEO:
ORBITING CARBON OBSERVATORY OVERVIEW PLAY
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Comet Lulin visits inner Solar System
On Tuesday, Comet Lulin will make its first visit to the inner Solar System, streaking past the Earth at a distance of 38 million miles, or 160 times further than the Moon.
FULL STORY
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Planet finder on launch pad for March 5 blastoff
A space telescope that will search for Earth-like planets in the galaxy was mounted atop a Delta 2 rocket at its Cape Canaveral launch pad Saturday.
MISSION STATUS CENTER
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Additional coverage for subscribers:
VIDEO:
KEPLER PRE-LAUNCH OVERVIEW BRIEFING PLAY
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Space shuttle Discovery's launch put on hold
After a marathon 13-hour flight readiness review, NASA managers late Friday were unable to reach a consensus on launching the shuttle Discovery Feb. 27 with suspect hydrogen flow control valves. As a result, senior management decided not to set an official launch date and Discovery's mission was put on hold pending additional analysis and discussions next Wednesday.
FULL STORY
MISSION STATUS CENTER - live updates!
PREVIEW STORY
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Additional coverage for subscribers:
VIDEO:
FRIDAY NIGHT'S LAUNCH POSTPONEMENT BRIEFING PLAY
VIDEO:
NARRATED MISSION OVERVIEW MOVIE PLAY
VIDEO:
MEET SHUTTLE DISCOVERY'S ASTRONAUTS PLAY
MORE:
STS-119 VIDEO COVERAGE
MORE:
HIGH DEFINITION VIDEO
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1st day on job sees most powerful cosmic explosion
Adam Goldstein's first day on the job tending the Gamma-ray Burst Monitor instrument on NASA's Fermi Gamma-ray Space Telescope was a doozy.
FULL STORY
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Jovian moons top priority for next flagship mission
Europa and Ganymede, two moons of Jupiter believed to harbor underground oceans of liquid water, are the highest-priority targets for the next robotic mission to the solar system's outer planets, scientists announced Wednesday.
FULL STORY
NASA STATEMENT
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NASA's Dawn spacecraft sling-shots around Mars
NASA's Dawn spacecraft passed a crucial waypoint on the way to the asteroid belt Tuesday, whizzing 340 miles above Mars to use the planet's gravity to set up for the probe's arrival at its first target in 2011.
FULL STORY
FLYBY PREVIEW
VIDEO: MISSION VIDEO COVERAGE
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Astronomers unveiling life's cosmic origins
Processes that laid the foundation for life on Earth -- star and planet formation and the production of complex organic molecules in interstellar space -- are yielding their secrets to astronomers armed with powerful new research tools, and even better tools soon will be available.
FULL STORY
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OTHER HEADLINES Additional stories today
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Cosmologists aim to observe first moments of universe -- During the next decade, a delicate measurement of primordial light could reveal convincing evidence for the popular cosmic inflation theory, which proposes that a random, microscopic density fluctuation in the fabric of space and time gave birth to the universe in a hot big bang approximately 13.7 billion years ago.
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Best image of Carina
Using the modest 2.2-metre telescope at La Silla in Chile, European Southern Observatory astronomers have taken the best image to date of the Carina Nebula, which lies 7,500 light years away.
FULL STORY
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FAA warns of possible falling satellite debris
The Federal Aviation Administration issued a warning to pilots and aircrews Saturday advising them to be on the lookout for possible "re-entry of satellite debris," presumably from an unprecedented satellite collision in space last week.
FULL STORY
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Shuttle Discovery launch postponed once again
Launch of the shuttle Discovery on a space station assembly mission, already delayed twice because of concern about suspect hydrogen valves, was pushed back again late Friday, to no earlier than Feb. 27, to give engineers more time to assess the safety of the shuttle's external tank pressurization system.
FULL STORY
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Ariane 5 rocket trucks four spacecraft into orbit
Beginning another busy year of transporting satellites from Earth to space, the commercial Ariane 5 rocket successfully launched two communications spacecraft and a pair of military payloads Thursday evening.
FULL STORY
OUR ARIANE ARCHIVE
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Space station receives latest Russian resupply ship
A Russian cargo freighter safely docked to the international space station early this morning, delivering more than two tons of supplies and equipment for the outpost and its resident crew.
FULL STORY
STORE: SPACE STATION PATCHES
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Additional coverage for subscribers:
VIDEO:
CARGO SHIP AND STATION RENDEZVOUS IN SPACE PLAY
VIDEO:
PROGRESS 32P FREIGHTER DOCKS TO THE STATION PLAY
MORE:
EXPEDITION 18 VIDEO COVERAGE
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Spirit gets energy boost from cleaner solar panels
A small but important uptick in electrical output from the solar panels on NASA's Mars Exploration Rover Spirit this month indicates a beneficial Martian wind has blown away some of the dust that has accumulated on the panels.
FULL STORY
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Two satellites collide
In an unprecedented space collision, a commercial Iridium communications satellite and a presumably defunct Russian Cosmos satellite ran into each other Tuesday above northern Siberia, creating a cloud of wreckage.
FULL STORY
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Shuttle valve tests continue but yet not complete
Testing to determine the threat posed by suspect hydrogen flow control valves - work that has delayed the shuttle Discovery's planned launch from this week to no earlier than Feb. 22 - is proceeding at multiple NASA field centers and so far, engineers say, no show stoppers have been identified. But testing is far from complete and it's not yet known whether NASA can develop an acceptable near-term flight rationale.
FULL STORY
STS-119 FLIGHT PLAN
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Additional coverage for subscribers:
VIDEO:
MEET SHUTTLE DISCOVERY'S ASTRONAUTS PLAY
VIDEO:
INTERVIEW WITH COMMANDER LEE ARCHAMBAULT PLAY
VIDEO:
INTERVIEW WITH PILOT TONY ANTONELLI PLAY
VIDEO:
INTERVIEW WITH MS1 JOE ACABA PLAY
VIDEO:
INTERVIEW WITH MS2 STEVE SWANSON PLAY
VIDEO:
INTERVIEW WITH MS3 RICKY ARNOLD PLAY
VIDEO:
INTERVIEW WITH MS4 JOHN PHILLIPS PLAY
VIDEO:
INTERVIEW WITH MS5 KOICHI WAKATA PLAY
MORE:
STS-119 VIDEO COVERAGE
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Two Russian satellites
share ride to space
A Proton rocket blasted off from a snow-covered launch pad early Wednesday and successfully put a pair of Russian civil communications satellites 22,300 miles above Earth.
FULL STORY
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Swift, Fermi probe fireworks from flaring star
Astronomers using NASA's Swift satellite and Fermi Gamma-ray Space Telescope are seeing frequent blasts from a stellar remnant 30,000 light-years away. The high-energy fireworks arise from a rare type of neutron star known as a soft-gamma-ray repeater. Such objects unpredictably send out a series of X-ray and gamma-ray flares.
FULL STORY
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Three European space missions extended
The European Space Agency's Science Programme Committee has extended the operations of the Mars Express orbiter, Venus Express orbiter and Earth magnetosphere mission called Cluster.
FULL STORY
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Supply ship launches for rendezvous with station
A three-day orbital chase by a robotic cargo freighter to catch the international space station began high above Earth early this morning with the successful launch of the Russian-made resupply ship.
FULL STORY
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OTHER HEADLINES Additional stories today
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NASA awards NuSTAR launch to Orbital Sciences -- NASA has selected Orbital Sciences to launch the Nuclear Spectroscopic Telescope Array, or NuSTAR, high energy X-ray telescope. The spacecraft will fly in 2011 aboard a Pegasus XL rocket from the Pacific Ocean's Kwajalein Atoll.
Major test of second AEHF satellite underway -- Lockheed Martin announced Monday that the second Advanced Extremely High Frequency military communications satellite is now undergoing thermal vacuum testing at the company's Sunnyvale, Calif. facilities.
James Webb Space Telescope's spine now being built -- Scientists and engineers who have been working on the James Webb Space Telescope mission for years are getting very excited, because some of the actual pieces that will fly aboard the Webb telescope are now being built. One of the pieces, called the Backplane, is like a "spine" to the telescope.
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Geologic features in Martian craters shaped by water
Scientists at the Tucson-based Planetary Science Institute have found further evidence for the large role that water has likely played in shaping the Martian landscape.
FULL STORY
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Astronomers spot a
cosmic dust fountain
Space dust annoys astronomers just as much as the household variety when it interferes with their observations of distant stars. And yet space dust also poses one of the great mysteries of astronomy.
FULL STORY
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New technique to measure asteroids' sizes and shapes
A team of French and Italian astronomers have devised a new method for measuring the size and shape of asteroids that are too small or too far away for traditional techniques, increasing the number of asteroids that can be measured by a factor of several hundred.
FULL STORY
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History abounds in launch of crucial weather satellite
A last-of-its-kind weather observatory with roots reaching back to the earliest days of U.S. space exploration rocketed into orbit Friday morning to keep logging environmental records until a long-delayed new generation of satellites is ready.
FULL STORY
MISSION STATUS CENTER - live updates!
PHOTO GALLERY: MORE LAUNCH PICTURES
PHOTO GALLERY: LAUNCH GALLERY
PHOTO GALLERY: TOWER ROLLBACK
PRE-FLIGHT STORY
OUR DELTA ROCKET ARCHIVE
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Additional coverage for subscribers:
VIDEO:
DELTA 2 ROCKET LIFTS OFF WITH NOAA-N PRIME PLAY
VIDEO:
LAUNCH REPLAYS: PAD CAMERA NO. 1 PLAY
VIDEO:
LAUNCH REPLAYS: PAD CAMERA NO. 2 PLAY
VIDEO:
LAUNCH REPLAYS: PAD CAMERA NO. 3 PLAY
VIDEO:
CONFIRMATION OF A SUCCESSFUL LAUNCH PLAY
VIDEO:
LAUNCH PAD'S SERVICE TOWER ROLLED BACK PLAY
VIDEO:
WEDNESDAY'S LAUNCH ATTEMPT SCRUBBED PLAY
VIDEO:
HIGHLIGHTS OF THE DELTA 2'S LAUNCH CAMPAIGN PLAY
VIDEO:
HIGHLIGHTS OF THE SATELLITE LAUNCH CAMPAIGN PLAY
VIDEO:
NOAA-N PRIME MISSION OVERVIEW FILM PLAY
VIDEO:
PRE-LAUNCH NEWS BRIEFING PLAY
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Shuttle Discovery's launch postponed a few more days
Launch of shuttle Discovery on a space station assembly mission, delayed earlier this week from Feb. 12 to no earlier than Feb. 19 because of concern about critical hydrogen flow control valves, now is slipping to at least Feb. 22 to give engineers more time to complete testing, NASA officials said Friday.
FULL STORY - updated with official delay
LAUNCH WINDOWS CHART
STS-119 FLIGHT PLAN
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Asteroid sampler spacecraft heads back to planet Earth
Japan's Hayabusa probe, potentially loaded with the first rock samples from an asteroid, fired up one of its ion engines Wednesday to begin the second phase of the explorer's return voyage to Earth.
FULL STORY
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Spirit rover resumes driving
NASA's Mars Exploration Rover Spirit resumed driving Saturday after engineers gained confidence from diagnostic activities earlier in the week evaluating how well the rover senses its orientation.
FULL STORY
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Thruster swap planned aboard Cassini spacecraft
The Cassini spacecraft will swap to a backup set of propulsion thrusters in mid-March due to degradation in the performance of the current set of thrusters.
FULL STORY
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CoRoT discovers most Earth-like exoplanet yet
The CoRoT space telescope has detected an exoplanet less than twice the size of Earth orbiting a Sun-like star, and with a surface you could walk on, astronomers speculate.
FULL STORY
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Shuttle Discovery's launch delayed at least one week
Launch of shuttle Discovery on a mission to deliver a final set of solar arrays to the international space station has been delayed at least one week, to no earlier than Feb. 19, to give engineers additional time to assess the health of critical hydrogen flow control valves that keep the ship's external tank pressurized during the climb to space.
FULL STORY
MISSION STATUS CENTER
STS-119 COVERAGE ARCHIVE
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Additional coverage for subscribers:
VIDEO:
NASA OFFICIALS ANNOUNCE LAUNCH DELAY PLAY
VIDEO:
SPACE STATION'S VIBRATIONS DURING REBOOST PLAY
MORE:
STS-119 VIDEO COVERAGE
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Iran puts its first satellite into Earth orbit
Iran launched its first satellite into orbit Monday using a modified homemade long-range missile, thrusting the Islamic republic into an elite club of space-faring nations, state media reported.
FULL STORY - updated with more details
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Read our earlier news archive page.
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